Touch Base
by Lys ap Adin
Summary: Yamamoto really is a good son. Yamamoto, his dad.


**Title:** Touch Base**  
Characters:** Yamamoto**  
Summary:** Yamamoto really is a good son.**  
Notes:** For Cliché Bingo, prompt: "Road Trip." Future-fic, takes place before the TYL arc. 747 words, fluffy.

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**Touch Base**

He always remembered that call, later, because it was the last one he made before the whole world went to hell, and they called him back to Japan.

"They really do mean it when they say that the States are huge," Takeshi said, stretching his legs out with relief. "Hours on the bus, Tousan, seriously. It's crazy." He still couldn't quite fathom it, even after weeks of it: getting on a bus after a game, and falling asleep to the gentle rocking of the wheels, and waking up hours later only to find that they still weren't there yet. It was crazy.

His father made a patient sound at him, and Takeshi counted up the time difference again, no, he was pretty sure it was safe to be calling now. Probably. "Have you seen anything interesting?"

"Hah-hah, only if you like baseball stadiums. And, um, corn." And the bars, but Takeshi wasn't entirely sure he wanted to talk about those. Not with his _father_, anyway. "I've seen so much corn, it's not even funny any more."

"I can't imagine that it was all that funny to begin with," his father said. His tone was grave enough to suggest that he had that sly twinkle in his eyes as he said it.

"Hah! Yeah, not really." Takeshi shifted the phone from one shoulder to the other, and ignored the impatient gesture his roommate made at him. "But it's interesting, I guess. How the landscape is so different." His teammates assured him that there would be other parts of the country that looked--well, not like home, exactly, but different from the long, undulating folds of the Midwest and its endless fields of corn and soybeans.

"You should take a picture for me," Tousan said, and in the background, Takeshi heard the jingling of the bell that hung over the shop door. "Ah, someone has come in. I have to go. Do well, and be good!"

Takeshi grinned; he always said that. Sometimes he was persuaded that Tousan still thought he was six. "Always," he promised, and ended the call.

"Fucking finally," his roommate said, and rolled his eyes. "Who _was_ that?" He waggled his eyebrows as Takeshi put the phone away and stretched again. "Girlfriend back home?"

Takeshi laughed. "Yeah, um, no. That was my dad."

That made his roommate blink, like he wasn't quite expecting that one. "You just spent--" He stopped, theatrical, and craned his head to look at the bedside clock "--half an hour talking to your old man when we could have been out drinking?"

"Mm," Takeshi said. "Yes?"

His roommate groaned and ran his hands over his face. "God, seriously? The hell did you have to talk about?"

"Not much, I guess. The weather, and how the shop is." Takeshi wrinkled his nose, thinking. "The bus rides, and the corn. And how the games are going." Fairly well, those. Well enough that he was glad to have accepted the offer to play with this minor league team for a season, the last before his other commitments kicked in. "Oh, and he wanted to make sure I wasn't neglecting my studies."

His roommate snorted. "Oh man, way to live the stereotype." He bounced to his feet before Takeshi could ask what that was supposed to mean, and clapped his hands together. "Anyway! There's a bar waiting for us, and booze, and maybe girls!"

"It's good that you never give up hope," Takeshi told him, with every bit of fake sincerity he could muster.

It got him a pillow to the face, but it was worth it for the look of sheer outrage on the guy's face. "The hell you say," he proclaimed, puffing up, and Takeshi was reminded of a pissed-off cat, or maybe just Gokudera in a proper fury. "I bet I can get a girl in bed faster than you can."

Takeshi smiled at him, easy. "Oh, I'm sure you can," he said, not even lying. "No need to bet. I'm low enough on cash as it is."

That was enough to appease his roommate, who wasn't like Gokudera at all in the way he forgave and forgot, fast as blinking his eyes. "Yeah, well, okay, I'd feel bad about taking the last of your money," he conceded, and jerked his head at the door. "Anyway. Time's a-wasting. You ready?"

"Sure," Takeshi said, and followed him out, since he was right--there was no point in killing any more time.

**- end -**

Comments are, as always, lovely.


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